The commentator on Sharḥ al-Iqnāʿ said: “In absolute terms, this ḥadith refers to selling one debt for another.”

• Points derived from the ḥadith:

1 – Selling kāliʾ is the same as selling a debt for a debt. Ibn al-Munḏir said, “There is unanimous agreement that selling one debt for another is impermissible.” Al-Wazīr likewise stated, “They agree that the sale of a debt for a debt is invalid.”

2 – The sale of a debt appears in several forms:

– Selling a liability owed by the debtor to the very person who owes it, for a deferred price or for an immediate price that has not yet been taken into possession.

– Selling a liability owed by the debtor to someone other than the debtor, again for a deferred price or for an immediate price that has not yet been taken into possession.

– Treating the outstanding debt as the capital of a salam contract.

– When each of two people owes the other a debt of a different kind—such as gold and silver—and they exchange the two debts without either consideration being delivered.

– A man buys something on credit; when the term falls due he is unable to pay, so he says, “Sell it to me again on a new term with an increase,” and the seller does so, without any exchange of possession between them.

• Divergent opinions among the scholars:

Shaykh al-Islām (Ibn Taymiyyah) said: “Taking compensation for a debt in the form of something else—even a salam debt—is permissible according to Mālik and in one narration from Aḥmad; this view is closest to his foundational principles and is the sound position.”

Therefore, the correct view—held by the majority of scholars—is that it is permissible to sell a debt to the one who owes it, provided that if it is exchanged for something with which deferred exchange is forbidden, immediate payment and transfer of possession are stipulated.

Shaykh ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Saʿdī said: “The correct opinion is that every debt recorded in the liability of a person—whether a salam debt or otherwise—may be exchanged for something else, on condition that the counter-value is taken into possession before the two parties separate, owing to the general wording of the report from Ibn ʿUmar: ‘We used to sell camels for dinars and receive payment in dirhams, and we used to sell them for dirhams and receive payment in dinars, so we asked the Messenger of Allah…’”